Central to the piece is the notion that the public increasingly expects far to much of politicians and far too much from government, and that we harm ourselves in the process.

“…Americans have come to firmly believe that we should have social policies — that government should do something to improve material and moral conditions. The problem is that such expectations lead to demands that government do what cannot be done, which threatens democratic institutions. Obama worship and Trump’s demagoguery are the most visible signs of such corrosive attitudes.

“In such an overheated situation, it is useful to revisit the work of Edward Banfield. On nearly all of the issues that comprise the contemporary policy debate — social class, race, employment, the minimum wage, education, crime, immigration, and housing — Banfield’s work still illuminates a great deal.

“Reflection on Banfield’s insights into human nature and the importance of culture provides one with an appreciation of the limits and pitfalls of political and policy reform. It also affords us the opportunity to gain insight into contemporary expectations of and dissatisfaction with American government. In particular, his thought offers a powerful case for why we should moderate our hopes and our fears about the trajectory of American politics and society.

A refresher course is therefore useful; however, such a course is unlikely to please liberals and may please only a few conservatives. Banfield delighted in debunking others’ arguments and assumptions. As James Q. Wilson said at the memorial of his mentor and frequent collaborator, “[G]etting a fuzzy thought past Ed was like throwing a lamb chop past a wolf.” This applied to liberal and conservative ideas alike. Rereading Banfield is a little like taking a cold shower — not something you want to do every day, but it’s periodically good for you….”

More than 60 years ago, an American family arrived in a seemingly idyllic town in Southern Italy. Stone buildings resembled “a white beehive against the top of a mountain.” Donkeys and pigs idled in the ancient, winding streets. A town crier tooting a brass horn announced “fish for sale in the piazza at 100 lire per kilo.” There were two churches, two bars, and a movie theater. Shops offered locally made shoes and olive oil, and locally-sourced meat. Nearly everyone farmed and tended animals and knew one another, at least by name or reputation.

Yet Chiaromonte’s 3400 residents were anything but content. They were crushingly poor and simmered with resentment. Why? In great part, as the Americans learned during their stay, because they were too family-focused.

Political scientist Edward C. Banfield went to Italy in 1954 to better understand poverty. Researchers then tended to assume people were poor due to lack of education or because they were victimized by the government or capitalism. Banfield himself had been a reporter and had traveled across the United States during the Great Depression, so he knew the reality was more complex. In order to understand why people are as they are and do what they do, Banfield believed one needed to learn how they viewed the world and their place within it.

This may sound self-evident, but it cut against the academic grain of the day. The University of Chicago, where Banfield earned his doctorate and had a teaching appointment, was known for its shoe-leather sociological research. Its Prof. William Foote Whyte, for example, wrote Street Corner Society in 1943 after four years studying a slum in Boston’s North End.

In 1956, Banfield and his wife Laura (who spoke Italian) spent nine months in Chiaromonte and interviewed dozens of residents. They pored over census data and official records, enlisted some residents to keep diaries, and conducted psychological surveys on others. Two years later, The Moral Basis of a Backward Society described what they had found and concluded that Chiaromonte’s poverty and grim melancholia (la miseria) were rooted in its people’s “amoral familism.”

A hat tip to Robert Schadler for telling me about this review. Schadler had Banfield for a one-on-one reading course at the University of Pennsylvania in the early 1970s. He also was managing editor of Political Science Reviewer for a decade. These days, Schadler is a Senior Fellow in Public Diplomacy at the American Foreign Policy Council, and the President of Educational Enrichments, an information service based in Washington, DC.

Political scientist Edward C. Banfield argued 40 years ago that corruption is an inherent feature of government. Like Cost, he believed fragmented government invites interest-group manipulation and extra-governmental authority structures, such as party organizations and public-private alliances. But Banfield described many other factors that are independent of political fragmentation, grounded instead in the nature of political decision-making and monopoly. These included: fragmented authority within government organizations; ambiguous and often conflicting goals; lack of objective metrics of performance; transitory leadership; inflexible pay scales and inability to punish even egregious misbehavior; captive “shareholders” (citizens); and the powerful lure of non-pecuniary incentives, especially the opportunity to wield power. The importance of these general characteristics is suggested by the prevalence of corruption and interest-group capture in state and local government, such as Plunkitt’s Tammany Hall machine, which are free of Cost’s mismatch.

DeMuth was a student and great friend of Banfield, and understands Banfield’s work better than anyone.

]]>kevinrkosarSource: TheCrimson.comWho Was Edward C. Banfield and Why Should You Read His Books and Articles?https://edwardcbanfield.wordpress.com/2015/09/04/who-was-edward-c-banfield-and-why-should-you-read-his-books-and-articles/
Fri, 04 Sep 2015 19:49:18 +0000http://edwardcbanfield.wordpress.com/?p=277Continue reading Who Was Edward C. Banfield and Why Should You Read His Books and Articles?]]>Edward C. Banfield was a political scientist who taught for nearly four decades at the University of Chicago, Harvard University, and the University of Pennsylvania. He served as an adviser to two presidents (Nixon and Reagan) and many lesser officials, and held academic positions, including the vice presidency of the American Political Science Association. Banfield wrote 16 books and scores of articles and essays, which received widespread acclaim and criticism….

Banfield’s writings often offended the then-popular elite views of individuals as rational and directed by salubrious motives. He had many warm friends and was himself devoted to “the life of the mind,” but his reading of the evidence led him to a view of human nature that was decidedly unromantic. This is not to say that Banfield did not believe in the power of reason—he did. But he agreed with philosopher David Hume’s dictum that for most persons reason usually is “the slave of the passions”… (Read more at ContemporaryThinkers.org)

Although federal support of the cities has increased sharply in recent years, it has not had the results that were hoped for in those parts of the cities where conditions are worst. This is partly because the biggest federal outlays have been in the suburban fringes and in rural areas. It is also because the federal government has tied too many strings to the aid it has given. Over-regulation has led to waste and frustration.

With about 400 grant-in-aid programs involving roughly $10 billion a year, federal aid to cities is now on such a scale that the federal bureaucracy is incapable of administering it. In the view of the Task Force, most city governments can be trusted to use federal funds in the manner Congress intends, but whether one trusts them or not it is necessary to allow them much more latitude because the alternative is waste and frustration and/or their replacement by a vastly expanded federal-state
bureaucracy.

“I would like to touch upon one aspect of Jim’s intellectual development; specifically the importance of Edward C. Banfield, and mention a few other persons.I have said on another occasion that my contribution to academic political science was stimulating Jim to work with Ed Banfield.”

Full citation: Peter B. Clark, “Regarding James Q. Wilson,” remarks for Thinking About Politics: A Conference Dedicated to Explaining and Perpetuating the Political Insights of James Q. Wilson, Harvard University and Boston College, April 4-5, 2013.

Edward C. Banfield went from the University of Chicago to Harvard, and then was lured to the University of Pennsylvania for a short time. Thomas E. Lanctot, a former Banfield student there, graciously provided a paper photocopy of this article. (Presently, the Pennsylvania Gazette’s online archive does not go back to 1973.)

At UPenn, Banfield was harassed by Bonnie Blustein, who trashed him in the school newspaper as a neo-Nazi. She and others also disrupted his lectures.

This article provides some biographical material on Banfield and includes a photograph of him in Rittenhouse Square. It also pokes some fun at the often ludicrous criticisms of Banfield’s The Unheavenly City (Boston: Little, Brown, 1970). You can read this article in its entirety above. The scroll bar on the right-side of the frame allows you to move through the pages. Click the Scribd button on the frame around it to view a larger copy in a new window.

Banfield examined the various arguments for government funding for arts and found them nonsensical and contradictory. So, for example, if looking at great painting is good for the public, then would it not make sense to cease funding museums (which few Americans can access), sell off the masterpieces, and use the proceeds to send high quality copies of paintings to public schools nationwide? Ultimately, Banfield exposed much of arts policy as subsidies for the upper class in major metropolitan areas.

Above is a print advertisement that Banfield sent to one of his former University of Pennsylvania students, Thomas Lanctot, who provided a copy of it to this website. Clicking on the image above will expand it to full size. On the right, one sees the photographer was Bruce Kovner. This is amusing, as Kovner was a Banfield student at Harvard, and Kovner went on to start Caxton Associates and become a billionaire. (Kovner, it should be added, remained a dear friend of Ed and Laura Banfield to the end.)